


Consummate Professionals

by splash_the_cat



Series: Ordinary Birthday series [3]
Category: Stargate SG-1
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2004-09-08
Updated: 2004-09-08
Packaged: 2018-01-27 00:01:12
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,671
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1707398
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/splash_the_cat/pseuds/splash_the_cat
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>If this is his idea of romantic...</p>
            </blockquote>





	Consummate Professionals

**Author's Note:**

> Set S7. For Jara, because this whole series is all her fault. And many, many, many thanks to MV, Karen, nanda, and Tammy.

Ten seconds, Jack decided. Ten seconds more and he was going to reach over and poke Daniel in the eye.

Okay, maybe that was a little extreme, but Daniel had been sitting there, coffee cup hovering in mid-air, just staring at Jack for the last few minutes.

It was creeping him out.

"Daniel." Jack settled for snapping his fingers a few inches from Daniel's nose, and the cup resumed motion along its original trajectory.

"Hmm?" Daniel murmured around a mouthful of coffee.

"If you don't stop staring at me, I'm... gonna poke you in the eye."

Always go with the first instinct, after all.

Daniel blinked and pushed up his glasses. "Oh, sorry, Jack."

"Did I miss something when I shaved?" Jack patted his face. "Do I have a toothpaste mustache? What?"

"I... uh, well..." Daniel glanced to his left, where Teal'c sat reading the paper.

"Daniel Jackson is curious as to your emotional state, O'Neill," Teal'c supplied from behind the entertainment section.

"My emotional state?"

"Well, lately you've been, well..." Daniel's coffee cup swung in a dangerous arc. "I mean..."

"Spit it out, Daniel."

"You're happy," Daniel said, suddenly, accusingly. "And it's... weird."

Okay, so maybe Daniel had a point. He was happy and it _was_ weird, but Jack was so not complaining. Not when there'd been three months of Carter smiling at him and Carter teasing him and Carter flirting with him.

He'd worried it would all be awkward after she'd shown up at his house the night of her birthday. Especially when he'd run into her outside the briefing room the next morning and grinned like an idiot. But she'd just smiled back and told him he had something in his teeth.

After that, everything between them had been... different. Relaxed. Easy. Comfortable. So unlike the last three years that he occasionally found himself squashing the urge to skip down the corridors.

Daniel cleared his throat and Jack realized he probably _looked_ like he wanted to go skipping down the corridors. So he forced a scowl and glared at Daniel for good measure.

"So let me get this straight. You think something's wrong because I'm _happy_?"

"It is a logical assumption, O'Neill."

Sure enough, there went the eyebrow. "Why thank you, Mr. Spock." Jack reached over and yanked the paper out of Teal'c's hands. "Really. This just warms my heart."

Daniel and Teal'c exchanged long-suffering looks. "Jack, no offense, but come on. You're only really happy when you're-" And Daniel's eyes went wide. "You're up to something."

Shit.

Exaggerating his scowl, Jack started to disabuse Daniel of that notion, only to be interrupted by an airman appearing at the end of the table, holding out a thick manila folder. "General Hammond asked me to give this to you right away, and to tell you your flight's all set, Colonel."

Huh. It figured that the one time the cogs of bureaucracy spun smoothly for him, Jack wouldn't appreciate the timing.

Ignoring Daniel's speculative gaze and Teal'c's still-raised brow, he took the folder and waved the airman off with a grunt of thanks.

"Flight?" Daniel, sounding not-at-all casual in his interest.

"Yeah. Need to go to Washington take care of some... stuff." Flipping open the folder, Jack scanned the contents.

"Is everything well, O'Neill?"

It took every ounce of willpower he had not to grin like an idiot.

"Yeah, T. Everything's _great_."

 

****

Idiot.

After two days of the necessary meetings and paper signing and ass-kissing to finish enacting the plan he'd spent two hours convincing Daniel didn't exist (before finally caving and letting him and Teal'c in on it, with threats of death and doom and all manner of dire things if they breathed a word to anyone), Jack had been in such a hurry to get back to Colorado that he'd skipped the offer of a military flight in favor of a much earlier commercial option.

And then sat on the runway due to a technical delay for three hours, fidgeting and muttering and getting dirty looks from the flight attendants.

Jack threw his overnight bag on the couch and checked his watch. The post office had told him it would be delivered around three, so right about now Carter should be signing for the package he'd sent overnight from Washington.

Shit. He'd been hoping to at least have time to grab a shower, but the drive would take him twenty minutes, which, if he left right now, should put him on her doorstep just about the time she finished reading the documents.

Grinning, he yanked open the door. And froze.

Apparently the mailman had been early.

Sam Carter stood on his porch, cheeks flushed, eyes wide. She shoved a very familiar-looking folder against his chest. "What...This... I... You... _Colonel_?"

Jack took a step back, swinging his hands in front of him defensively. "Happy belated birthday?"

 

****

"You _transferred_?"

Carter had backed him into the house, down the hall, into the living room, and Jack was now trying to casually put the couch in between them. "Look, getting command of the new SGC training program at the Academy is a big deal. Besides," he pointed at the folder. "You got a promotion. And SG-1."

Not, he thought, that she was going to take that as a good excuse right about now.

"But it just makes no sense, sir." She paced between the couch and coffee table, one length for every question, spaced by short, precise turns. "Why now? Did something happen? Did they force you to do this? Is the NID involved? Have you talked to General Hammond? Do you need help?"

Okay, so maybe he'd forgotten to factor in a few little details.

" _Carter_." Jack leaned over the back of the couch and caught her arm, stopping her mid-step. "It's nothing like that. I just... I didn't pass my last physical."

"You..." Alarm replaced anger and she sagged down onto the couch, clutching the folder to her chest. "Oh. Are you... is there something..."

"No, no, Carter, nothing like that." Letting go of her arm, Jack came around and sat next to her, hand now hovering near her shoulder. "I knew it was coming. Fraiser warned me after PCX 223 last month that it didn't look good."

He knew she was assembling the pieces: why they hadn't been on a mission since then, why he'd been holed up with Hammond for most of the last two weeks, why he'd been spending so much time in his office actually doing his paperwork.

Her voice was small, and bordered on plaintive. "But nothing happened to you on 223."

"Carter, I'm _fifty-one_. My blood pressure's up, my knees are shot, I'm getting arthritis in my shoulder and I have to get up and pee half the night. It was time."

She stared at him for a long time before she nodded and let the folder fall to her lap. "But you're okay."

And oh, did the swell of relief in her voice make him feel like a complete ass. "Shit, Carter. I'm sorry. I shouldn't have dropped this on you this way. I guess I thought it would be, I don't know, cute. Kinda romantic, even."

"Cute? Romantic?" Carter's expression hovered somewhere between amusement and disbelief. And annoyance, but he was trying to ignore that. "With all due respect, sir, what the hell gave you that idea?"

"Well, you know, after what happened on your birthday with the... the... the..." He waved his hand toward the front door and watched comprehension wash across her features.

"Kiss."

"Yeah."

He wondered how she remembered it. He was pretty sure she didn't regret it, not with the way everything had been between them since, but given that he'd just changed everything between them _again_...

Carter had flipped open the folder and now thumbed through the documents, examining each one in what seemed like excruciating detail. Jack picked at the edge of a couch cushion and scuffed the toe of his shoe against the carpet, but her attention remained riveted on the papers. Eventually she closed the folder and set it on the coffee table. "So that's it. We're really not..."

"Nope."

"Oh."

It wasn't a very encouraging "oh," and when she took a deep breath and set her shoulders, Jack prepared himself for the worst.

Until she looked at him. Any lingering annoyance had been chased away by something a little wild - a sharp relief of recklessness and humor that widened her eyes and curved her mouth and made him want to adjust his suddenly too-tight pants.

Which she eyed speculatively. "I guess it's time to open my present then."

Holy fucking shit.

Suddenly her hands were in his hair and her mouth was hot and wet on his and really, this was the best damn idea he'd had in a long time.

Until a small niggling part of him that still felt a little guilty about the deception said, "Maybe... we should..." It was damn hard to form a coherent thought when she was licking at his bottom lip like that. "I mean, oh, _OH_... Holy... take things slow."

"Next time." And then her tongue was in his mouth and she leaned into him, pressing him back against the arm of the couch.

Flailing, he jammed an elbow behind him to stop his descent, and with groan pushed her back a little. "That's not what I meant, Carter!"

"You don't want to?" She sat back, the flush in her cheeks now spreading down below the collar of her shirt.

"No. I mean yes! Yes." Jack caught her hands and cupped them against his chest to keep her from scooting any further away. "I do. Want to. Really. A lot. But I don't want to rush you into anything."

Of all the reactions he'd expected, a bubble of slightly hysterical laughter was not one of them. Jack curled his fingers around hers, cleared his throat and thought that he should have just asked her out for dinner. "Carter? You, uh, all right?"

She'd stopped laughing, and started hiccupping. "You really are sweet sometimes, you know that?"

"Well, yeah, sure. I knew that."

Shaking her head, she hiccupped again and then kissed him. Softer this time, slow and warm and he wondered if he could still undo a bra with one hand. "Trust me. I don't feel rushed."

Oh, thank God. "Okay. That's good."

Very, very good, especially when he let go of her hands and they wandered down his chest and under his shirt. And that seemed like a really good idea, so he started on the buttons of her shirt until he got distracted by sucking on that little soft spot just above her collarbone.

"So. We, uh... uh, are we going to..."

Suddenly he was on his back, Carter straddling him, grinning a Cheshire Cat grin and grinding her hips against his ever so slowly. "Have sex?"

Yeah, dinner might have been nice, but this? So much better.

But not here. "Not on the couch. Not here. We are not going to... not gonna..."

"Have sex?"

"No... I mean yes!" Wondering when the hell he'd lost control of the situation, he heaved himself up, spilling her and her smirk backwards. "Upstairs. Bed. Now."

 

****

They were halfway up the stairs when she started taking off her clothes. Her shirt landed on his head, and he yanked it away just in time to catch her bra.

And then, at the top, she turned. And grinned.

Oh dear God.

Breasts. _Carter's_ breasts.

Jack tripped up the last few steps as she vanished into his room and stumbled in just in time to see her shimmy out of her jeans.

They both reached for her underwear at the same time.

Jack batted her hands away and hooked his fingers in the elastic, trying to yank them down even as he shuffled her toward the bed. Which was really hard to coordinate once she started trailing her fingers down his chest, his stomach, and, and...

All the air left his lungs in a strangled whoosh as they slid under the waistband of his khakis.

"Pants, Jack. Off." Carter yanked at the button of his fly with one hand as her other hand slid down and around his cock.

 _Ungh_.

"Jesus, Carter... Sam." Jack dragged her head closer, getting a mouthful of her hair before finding her mouth. Distracted by tongue and teeth and lips, he was only vaguely aware of her tugging down his zipper and shoving his pants and boxers over his hips.

Until everything got caught up on his shoes when she urged him to step out of the puddle of fabric.

"Shit!" Was all he managed before he toppled against her, cracking his forehead against her chin as he knocked her against the bed and they both slid to the floor in a tangled heap.

Well. This wasn't how he'd expected to end up horizontal with Carter.

He glanced to his right. She was on her back, staring up at the ceiling. "You okay?"

"I think I bit my tongue." When she stuck it out and poked at it, the absurdity of the last minute or so caught up with him and Jack couldn't help the whoop of laughter that made her cheeks flare brightly before she dragged a corner of his comforter over her head.

"You were right. We should have waited."

"I'm sorry." Jack toed off his shoes and kicked away his pants before grabbing the comforter and wrestling it away from her. "Really," he continued, when he saw that her face was still red. "I just... this... it's..."

" _Humiliating_."

"No." He grabbed her hands when she reached for the comforter again and scooted right up against her. "It's... cute."

"Cute."

"And maybe romantic?"

Carter stared at him, and then cracked up, burying her face against his shoulder. "Maybe," she murmured. "So now what?"

"Well," Jack brushed his knuckles along the swell of her breast, rubbing gently until he reached her nipple. "Is your tongue okay?"

Her "Uh huh" faded into a low moan when he rolled her nipple between his fingers and then caught her bottom lip between his teeth, kissing her slow and deep and oh, God, her tongue felt just fine.

She broke away, breathing hard, and before he could pull her back against him, she shoved him onto his back, one of her hands bunching his shirt up under his chin while she planted wet, open-mouthed kisses along his collarbone and down his chest.

"Hang on." He shrugged out of his shirt, and as she knelt over him and helped him pull it away, it left him staring right at her breasts.

He'd go with that. Sucking a nipple into his mouth, he worked at it with his tongue.

"Jack."

"Hmm?" He mumbled around the nipple before biting down a little.

"The floor's kinda - Oh, don't stop - hard and my - oh, just like that, yes - knees..."

So he dragged her on top of him and stroked down her back, working his fingers under the elastic of her underwear. Her eyes went wide as his hand continued over smooth skin, down between her thighs until his fingertip slid into her.

"Better?"

"Oh, that's... yeah. Jack." Soft, panting. " _Harder_."

He pulled her up a little more and eased another finger inside. This was _Carter_ , and his fingers were someplace he'd only imagined while jerking off, and she was so hot and wet and pressing down against his hand and his cock and this was the _best_ fucking idea he'd had in a long time.

And it got even better when he pulled away, rolled her onto the floor, and mapped the lines of her body by the compass of sounds she made. Ears. Chin. Shoulders. Nipples. Stomach. A sweet little spot in the hollow of her hip. She wriggled helpfully when he sat back and pulled off her underwear, and then he hooked an arm under her knee and ran his tongue along the inside of her thigh.

He grinned against the soft skin when he heard her swear and felt the sharp tug of fingers in his hair. Spreading her open with his fingers, he ran his thumb along her labia and followed the line he'd drawn with his tongue.

And Jack thought that, really, there was nothing like Samantha Carter gasping his name as he teased her clit with the tip of his tongue.

She kept saying his name as he licked and sucked, tugging at her clit with lips and teeth and stroking deep inside with his fingers.

"Jack, I Oh, I can't _now_ , damn it!"

He buried his mouth against her one last time before scrambling up her body. Kissed her hard as her nails dug painfully into his ass and her hips slammed up against his.

Which triggered something in his Carter-fogged brain. "Just, God, hold still a second. I don't have anything"

"I get shots, Jack. It's okay. And it's not like I've gone on a lot of dates lately."

"Shots?" Jack stared down at her. "They give you shots?"

"Oh for" She nudged him a little to the left with her knee and grabbed his cock. "Can we please talk about the delivery method of my birth control _later_?"

"Right, la-" Her mouth crashed against his and he let the thought fall away, pinning her hips down so he could get his right _there_.

And, oh, God, he slid inside her and this was the best fucking idea _ever_.

Jack forced himself to stay still, just for a moment, because he knew he wouldn't last long, not with the taste of her still on his tongue, or the way her leg curled over his. But Carter breathed in his ear, urging him on, and he had to move.

At some point he wondered if he should think of something to distract himself, to try and make it last a little longer, but there was too much of her all around him - the press of her breasts against his chest, the soft little gasps every time he slammed into her - and he didn't want to think about anything else.

He shoved back so he could get a hand between them, and found his fingers tangled with hers. She'd apparently had the same idea. And when she grinned up at him, stroking her clit as he stroked her fingers, his world tilted in a wash of light and heat that knocked the breath out of him.

When he remembered to breathe again, Carter was still squirming under him. So he pulled out and slid down, brushed her fingers aside and bit down, just a little, on her clit.

Her startled yelp ended in a loud, drawn-out whine as every line of her body snapped taut before she twitched in an all-over shudder and sort of slumped back against the floor.

He lapped at her until she stopped shivering, and with a last long lick he inched up and pressed his face against her belly. He breathed a happy little sigh against her skin when he felt fingers threaded through his hair. "You good?"

She chuckled. "Something like that."

"Yeah." Jack found her other hand and squeezed. "Hey Carter?"

He felt her answering "Hmm?" vibrate through her diaphragm.

"The floor is kinda hard."

 

****

Jack jerked awake as the mattress shifted.

"Where you going?" He tried to grab Carter as she clambered off the end of the bed. Got a nice handful of firm thigh and then a foot in his ribs as she squirmed free.

"I'll be going _in_ the bed if you don't let go."

Snorting, he did. Listened to her stumble across the room and swear softly as she banged against something, before the bathroom door clicked shut and a thin outline of light appeared around the frame.

Carter. In his bathroom.

Tucking his hands behind his head, he lay back and grinned into the darkness.

The toilet flushed, and he heard the soft thumping of the hot water pipes. A minute later she climbed into the bed and a damp hand slid across his stomach. "We should talk."

He saw the set line of her lips as his eyes adjusted to the dark. "I know."

"This is going to change things."

"I'm pretty sure things changed the night you showed up at my door in your pajamas, Carter."

She snorted against the pillow. "Yes. But that folder of paperwork downstairs, and this?" She laid a hand on his hip, rubbing lazy circles with her thumb. "We're talking orders of magnitude here, Jack."

She had, unfortunately, a very good point. "So that means?"

Her hand stilled. And then she said, "We should have gone slow."

"Probably," Jack conceded. "But I'm not gonna regret that we didn't."

"Me either." And boy, was he relieved when she said that. She sighed and shifted closer, resting her head against his chest. "I just don't want to..."

"Screw this up," he finished for her. "Me either." Not when her lips were so warm against his skin. "Do you want to try slow?"

"After this? Do you think we can?"

"Well, maybe. If you were here and I was... on Chulak." He tipped her face up and kissed her. "Look. We'll just have to take it day by day or something. This whole relationship thing has got to be easier than some of the crap we've done, right?"

That made her smile, and for now, that was enough for him. "I don't know. I mean, I can zat the bad guys when they piss me off."

"What, like I'm ever going to piss you off. Innocence incarnate, here."

"Uh huh, sure." Chuckling, she turned away onto her side and tugged at his arm until he followed and spooned behind her. "Go to sleep, Jack. We'll talk tomorrow."

"Yeah, whatever." He buried his face in her hair and settled his hand low across her belly. "Will you still respect me in the morning?"

"As long as you make me breakfast."

 


End file.
